NAC Attacks: Lockdown's Enforcer 4.5 Is On The Job

Network access control vendor Lockdown Networks in mid-September took the wraps off a new version of its Enforcer NAC appliance, which includes improved VPN features for companies with legions of mobile workers.

Enforcer 4.5 provides more control over networks by increasing the efficiency of information that's gathered about devices on the network, said Dan Clark, vice president of marketing at Seattle-based Lockdown. As part of the Enforcer 4.5 release, Lockdown Commander, a stand-alone appliance that manages multiple Enforcers, now has better scalability and NAC data reporting, he said.

"From the user interface, Commander can now see all the Enforcers and control points [WLAN access points] that are associated with it, and it can also import the existing Enforcer configuration," Clark said.

Although Enforcer is usually deployed out-of-band to ensure network performance isn't affected, a key new feature of the 4.5 release allows it to be deployed inline in order to handle SSL and IPsec VPN connections, Clark said. "Without being inline, there is no simple way to process traffic to manage the placement of devices on the network, given the way that VPNs handle traffic and identify devices," said Clark, adding that Enforcer 4.5 can support any SSL or IPsec VPN.

Jack Campbell, CTO of 3SG, an Anchorage, Alaska-based solution provider, said he's interested in the redundancy and high-availability features in the 4.5 release. "Our customers are looking forward to that, especially on the remote side," he said.

Having the IPsec and SSL VPN inline will reduce the amount of overhead these connections add to the network, which means the throughput and processing for new incoming systems is going to be much quicker, Campbell said. "Right now there's a 30-second delay before an incoming system gets online, and that should be significantly reduced," he said.

Enforcer 4.5 also allows administrators to centralize and apply policy to a device wherever it connects, such as a branch office or a meeting room, according to Clark.

Other new features of Enforcer 4.5 include a self-uninstalling capability for the Lockdown agent software, which is useful for companies that have contractors and temporary workers, as well as performance enhancements for Apple OS X, Clark said.

Enforcer 4.5 is scheduled for availability in October and is priced at $24,995.